


In the land of Lethe

by StarberryCupcake



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: 5+1 Things, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-17
Updated: 2017-10-17
Packaged: 2019-01-18 12:57:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12388542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarberryCupcake/pseuds/StarberryCupcake
Summary: It was the gestures that made him feel at home. It was her presence.Five times Phryne and Jack thought they were being somewhat discreet and one time they realized they actually never had been.





	In the land of Lethe

**Author's Note:**

> The title of the fic comes from the awesome song Bright Lights Late Nights by The Speakeasies’ Swing Band [that I totally recommend listening to](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cY0ZZkBOHaU). I thought it appropriate given that _lethe_ can mean “concealment” and not just “forgetfulness”.

**1\. Hugh Collins**

“Don’t you think you are being a bit…conspicuous, Miss Fisher?”

The word ‘conspicuous’ did not, in fact, completely signify the extent to which Detective Inspector Jack Robinson would have described the situation, if he was being entirely honest. Nevertheless, he supposed that, with due context, it was quite understandable.

“How so, Jack?” she fluttered her dark lashes mischievously and he knew perfectly well she understood him.

Still, he had to answer.

But where should he start? Because of her incredibly close proximity? Due to her hands on his tie and vest, slightly pulling him towards her? Or was it her right leg, bending just so, in the threshold between innocent flirtation and the intention to throw him backwards on the floor? Or, maybe, it was the fact that onlookers at the train station were intently staring at them? 

“People could think you were courting me, Miss Fisher, and where would that leave your unstained reputation?” he took her by the waist, gently, an action that served as an oxymoron to his words “A member of the police isn’t as interesting as a military aviator or a foreign adventurer”

She tightened her grip on his tie, her face impossibly close to his.

“Let them talk, Jack” she whispered, tauntingly “I have other things I rather focus on at the moment…”

Yet her focus was indeed interrupted by someone clearing their throat to catch their attention.

“E…excuse me, Sir” Hugh Collins sounded as if getting close to whatever was going on between them was the last thing he wanted “Miss Fisher” he nodded, respectfully, yet averted his eyes “We found a witness” 

And, just like that, the force of nature that was Phryne Fisher unlocked herself from Jack’s embrace and turned her attention to the case at hand, her eyes twinkling at the sound of evidence in the air.

“Duty calls, then” she started moving towards the entrance, all grace and confidence “Would you want a ride, Jack?” she added, turning around only halfway, a taunting smile on her red lips.

“I’d rather meet you there and survive the trip, Miss Fisher, thank you” there was half a smile on his own lips, as a response to hers.

“See you there, then” she winked and turned around once more, leaving the train station before them.

Jack didn’t know for how long he had been holding his breath. He turned to Collins, who was occupied with his notebook, either intently working on his clues or intently pretending that he was doing so.

“Let’s go, Collins” he sighed, and followed her, as usual.

“Yes, Sir” the blush on Collins’s face was enough of an answer to that dichotomy.

* * *

**2\. Dot Collins**

“Jack!” 

He heard her before he saw her, and it was still too late when he turned. She was sprinting towards him, literally _sprinting_ , speeding through the grass. He had no time to react properly when she threw herself at him like a wayward storm. He caught her almost midair, her arms tightly wrapped around him and her face hidden in the crook of his neck.

This was unexpected, even for her.

“Glad to see you too, Miss Fisher” he said, still holding her in his arms.

“It’s horrible, dreadful, I’m not going in there ever again!” she was noticeably shaking and seemed determined not to let go at any moment.

People from the Country Club were looking somewhere between entertained and offended by the public display on their grounds; which, to Jack, was rather hypocritical, taking into account that someone had just committed a murder on that very same place, and it was highly likely it had been a member of the club.

It was nice to know that people had their priorities in order.  

“Good morning, Inspector” Dot, who was walking at a normal pace for a human being that was not Phryne Fisher, reached them.

She seemed completely undisturbed and was already with her notebook in hand, much like her husband. The resemblance made Jack smile.

“Mrs. Collins” he tried to nod his greeting, but it was difficult, given the circumstances “What _happened_ in there?”

He wondered, not without some trepidation, what kind of sight would be as awful as to turn the unfathomable Miss Fisher away like that. The last time she had ran into someone's arms on a crime scene it had been to tackle a suspect to the ground and disarm him.  

“Spiders” Dot responded, unconcerned “a rather good amount, if I dare say so myself”

“'Good' is not the word I would use, Dot” she didn’t seem to be willing to let go, rather the opposite “It’s ghastly, Jack, Dot says there’s a…a…”

“A nest” Dot completed, checking her notes “They have quite the infestation, which is rather suspicious for a Country Club with standards as high as this one”

“An interesting environment to place a dead body in, I dare say” Jack tried to tie the pieces together in his head, but it was quite difficult to focus with Phryne’s lips on his neck, not caring to conceal the fact that she was breathing in his cologne as a way to ground herself “Miss Fisher?”

“Just two more minutes” she asked, rather softly “Please, Jack”

Dot hid a small smile and turned back towards the infested crime scene.

“I’ll let you know my observations later, Inspector” she walked ahead “It’d be best if we go in there without you then, Miss”

“Thanks, Dot” she almost sighed the words.

Detective Inspector Jack Robinson didn’t even mind the onlookers then, he placed a kiss on top of Phryne's head and she, in turn, whispered a thank you to him, a caress of lips on his neck, sweeter than a kiss.

* * *

**3\. Prudence Stanley**

“I am very sorry to interrupt your extremely crucial brooding, Inspector” a beautifully dressed Phryne Fisher walked towards him with a severe expression that exuded how much she was _not_ sorry “but I have come to a decision” 

“Pray tell, Miss Fisher,” he took a sip from his glass, he feared he was going to need it “which decision would that be?”

“Well, you see, I’ve spent most of this particular ball with different dance partners, having a very good time...” she stood next to him, looking at the dance floor ahead. 

Jack was grateful that she wasn’t looking at him with the severity with which she was speaking.

“Yet I’ve been waiting for you to ask me on, at the very least, _one_ dance”

Jack didn’t answer at that but rather drank whatever was left in his glass on one go.

“I’ve noticed, because my keen sense of observation is never at ease, that you have not kept any dance partner for the evening, but instead occupied yourself with brooding on this corner and watching _me_ dance”

“You _specifically_?” he smiled.

“I am very observant, Jack, and also, never wrong”

“Never?”

“Very rarely, but certainly not on this particular occasion”

“So?” he inquired “What was your decision?”

She sighed.

“As much as I love being asked to dance with grand gestures, I am also a modern woman, and I decided to renounce my will to be swooned and ask you myself for a dance,” she concluded “although I am still cross that you didn’t ask me”

There was an 'especially for the waltz' implicit there somewhere and Jack wasn’t surprised to notice it so clearly.

He suddenly wished for a refill. He was going to have to do without.

“I’m sorry, Miss Fisher, I can’t” he hoped that such an answer would be enough.

Of course, when it came to an unstoppable hurricane as Phryne Fisher, it was not enough at all.

“You _can’t_?!” her voice raised enough octaves to catch the attention of those around them and stop a few conversations of the closest groups of people as well “What do you mean you can’t? I am well aware of your capacity to dance, Jack Robinson, you could, at least, try to come up with a better excuse if…”

He turned to her then. It was not a common occurrence for Phryne Fisher, of all people, to leave an argument unfinished.

“If what?” he inquired, closing the distance between them slightly.

He wanted her to know he was willing to listen. Always.

“If you didn’t want to be seen in my company like _that_ ” she finished, rather doubtful.

And it was that uncharacteristic hesitation what obliged Jack to make a decision of his own. The decision to spill the truth, retaliations be damned.

“Phryne…” the use of her first name was enough to make her turn, her eyes entirely on him, and that made everyone else vanish from his thoughts completely “Your aunt asked me not to dance with you tonight”

It was clearly not the answer she was expecting, judging for the expression of astonishment mixed with betrayal that she wore on her face, otherwise radiant in her beautiful make-up. The look was so honest and so rare he wanted to commit it to memory.

“Aunt Prudence asked _what_?!”

If they weren’t catching people’s attention already, they certainly were after that.

“She was very polite about it, don’t be mad, I suppose her intentions were good, if rather questionable in application…”

“If you thought they were questionable, why didn’t you refuse?” she was much more upset than he had anticipated.

“Because I feel rather…intimidated by her, to be honest” he believed honesty was the best policy, after all “Although I’m more scared of you, at this moment”

“And, may I ask, why on earth did she request this?”

He put his glass down on a nearby table, sighed, and closed their distance a bit more, hoping to turn the conversation into a more private one again, despite all the attention they were increasingly gathering.

“She told me this ball is, after all, to look for new patrons for her charity work” he explained, intently looking at her inscrutable expression “and that you are incredibly charming at conversing with patrons, with your remarkable ability to get them to collaborate with just one dance” he took her hands, as he had longed to do all night “and that if they saw you dancing with me, they’d surely notice…'the difference', as she put it, and that might complicate things by focusing the attention on stuff we might not want to deal with tonight”

At that, he saw her expression change, slightly softening before him.

“It took me a bit off guard, I have to admit, but I couldn’t deny her” he continued, disarming himself in front of her, in the middle of a crowded space, because that seemed to be their constant state “Besides, the last thing I want to do is make you feel monopolized and trapped, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I ever made you feel like you don’t have ways out of this, out of _me_ …”

She disengaged her hands from his, entwining instead her arms behind his neck, a small smile on her lips, all fondness now.

“Dance with me, Jack Robinson” she proposed, determined “Not because we have to, but because we want to, because I _choose_ to, and you choose it too”

She guided him to the dance floor then, taking him by the arm, because she was indeed a modern woman, making choices, and choosing him.

“Who would have known Aunt Prudence would notice, though” she said, as they waltzed.

“Notice what?”

There was a hint of a secret in her eyes, a mischievous gleam that only those close enough could see, and only the brave dared discover.

“The ‘difference’” the answer was so soft that only he could hear it.

There was a smile on her voice when she said it, a fond one, and Jack wanted to drown in the sound of it.

* * *

**4\. Elizabeth MacMillan**

“And why were _you_ on the crime scene, Doctor MacMillan?” Jack asked, passing her a glass of whisky in the parlor at Wardlow “I suppose the trait of ‘being in the right place at the right time’ is one you both share?” 

He looked from her to her friend, who was extending her arm towards him in a silent request for a glass herself. He wondered, for a moment, how they had reached that point, where they didn’t have to ask some things aloud to be perfectly understood by the other.

He couldn’t remember a time when it had ever been so smooth and effortless with anyone before. He was scared to admit how not even with Rosie he had felt things fitting so easily. He remembered always making an effort for her, for her father, for the place he had to take to be beside her, and it all getting increasingly more impossible as time went by.

The war had rendered him incapable of taking on more fruitless effort, but he had always tried fitting in, being _more_ , for her. He had felt, to some extent, that he was always running after Rosie, attempting to catch up to her expectations, to her hopes, to the man she wanted him to become. It had been exhausting. After the war he had just stopped running.

He felt it was unfair to compare, though. Unfair to Rosie, to his past self, and also unfair to Phryne. Still it surprised him how, when initial fears and hesitations had been gone, everything clicked into place between them in a way he had never expected.

It was terrifying, but in an exhilarating way, much like Phryne herself.

“Well, that depends on how official this conversation is, Inspector” Dr. MacMillan sipped her drink nonchalantly, as if she hadn’t just said that to an officer of the police which whom she worked on a daily basis.

Some days Detective Inspector Jack Robinson felt his authority was dwindling.

“Beg your pardon?” he gave Miss Fisher her glass and turned to the Doctor once again “And what do you mean by that?”

“Well, if this is a conversation on my friend’s parlor, then I have no problem sharing some details” she continued “but if I’m under official interrogation, that’s a completely different matter”

“May I remind you that you work with the police, Doctor?” Jack felt at a loss all of a sudden, but he was getting used to it, after spending so much time in the company of these people.

“Law and justice are entirely different things though, Inspector” she sentenced, before finishing her drink.

There was a moment of silence in which Jack felt he had missed half of a conversation. He prided himself in his observational skills yet he felt they were speaking in two entirely different languages.

“Don’t worry, Mac” Phryne Fisher, though, she didn’t get lost so easily “Jack and I have an _understanding_ ”

“We do?” he turned to her, even more confused than before on what it was they were even talking about.

“Yes, since the Green Mill murder” she looked at Jack intently.

The Green Mill murder. _Oh_. That understanding.

“I see” he retreated to the fireplace, where he set his own glass “In that case, consider private matters off the record, Doctor”

There was a time in which he had simplified everything with the 'I don’t make the law, I enforce it' sort of mindset. It made things easier, especially when pleasing Rosie and her father. It never felt quite right, but he was too busy trying to keep his marriage afloat after the war to even think of stepping outside the confines of the rules.

He met the whirlwind that was Phryne Fisher when his marriage was ending. It was as if she had arrived in his life at precisely the right moment and right time, as usual. Not because of their budding relationship, but because he needed more of that perspective in his monotone life. A bit more of challenging the rules, of looking beyond what he was methodically meant to follow. Of making his own choices.

Their understanding in the Green Mill murder had been applied to Doctor MacMillan as well, and he had silently agreed to respect her private life, even if it meant stealing the occasional file and police evidence in order to protect her privacy.

“Well, then, in that case” she continued, undisturbed “I was enjoying my evening with a new partner”

“Who is she? Do I know her?” leave it to Miss Fisher to turn a case into a gossip column.

“No, you don’t know her, and I’d appreciate if you could stay out of it for, at least, as long as we can have a proper date without a murder taking place in the venue” there was severity in her words that expressed how her friend’s intervention was possibly a common occurrence.

“Oh, Mac, don’t be like that” she persisted, though, as she usually did “I could always lend you my parlor and dining room for a romantic evening, far away from the peeping crowds and all that fuss”

“I appreciate your offer, but it is _your_ peeping what I’m more concerned about sometimes”

“Excuse me? What is _that_ supposed to mean?”

At that, Doctor MacMillan turned her gaze entirely towards her friend and sat straighter, leaving her glass on the table beside her. Jack tried with all his might to stay as far from their argument as possible.

“Remember Amber?”

The question had implications that Jack was clearly missing, yet it was enough to shut any sort of retort from the Honorable Miss Fisher. That didn’t happen often.

“I’d hate to be intrusive and, believe me, I don’t tend to be in these kinds of situations, but…” he _had_ to ask “who’s Amber?”

There was, at that, a shared silence that was heavy enough to make Jack want to take back his question, if at all possible. He was about to suggest so when Doctor MacMillan spoke. 

“She was...” she sighed, losing her severity “It doesn’t matter now”

“It does matter, if she’s the reason why you don’t let me meet your partners, Mac” it was as if the silence spell that had bounded Miss Fisher’s lips had been lifted with that statement, and her words flew out from her all together, almost tripping over themselves to reach her friend “you know, you _have_ to know, it was never my intention…”

“I _know_ ” she answered, defeated, as if it took all her energy to be cross at Phryne for at least a minute “I know, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make it sound like it was your fault…it’s just that…” she turned to Jack then, like remembering he had been part of the conversation at one point “Amber was a girl I was in love with some years ago” she sighed “I had a tremendous crush on her, and I felt she was out of my league completely, but Phryne didn’t agree” she smiled with a strange mixture of fondness and sadness “she was intent on helping me, promised me she’d do anything in her power to get Amber to date me, and even if I asked her not to intervene…well, you know her, she can’t stay still”

At that, in an uncharacteristic move, Phryne Fisher, detective extraordinaire, always proud of her meddling tactics, lowered her gaze in shame.

“Turns out, Phryne’s well-intentioned strategy backfired” Doctor MacMillan’s smile was sad still, as she recounted “Amber received her attentions as interest and became infatuated with Phryne instead” she laughed, but it was devoid of humor “You can imagine how badly the ‘date’ Phryne had invited her to turned out when she understood _I_   was her date and not the dashing woman she was head over hills into”

“It never occurred to me…” Miss Fisher begun, but Doctor MacMillan didn’t let her finish.

“Look, Phryne, I get it” she turned to her then, less severe and more fond than ever “I love you, you’re my best friend, but sometimes you need to let things go” she reached out, grabbing her friend’s hand “I will introduce you to Clarice, if things go well between us, but until then, please let me do things my own way?”

“Fine” she conceded, smiling.

Doctor MacMillan kissed her friend’s hand, a seal of trust that felt so private Jack wondered if he should still be there, listening to their conversation.

“Besides, if I manage to stay out of _your_ exasperating relationship business, the least you can do is return the favor” she stood up, in search for another drink “You two are exhausting sometimes, I swear” she looked at both Jack and Phryne, silently judging.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about” Phryne’s sly smile towards him conveyed the extent to which she actually knew what her friend was talking about.

“Neither do I” he returned an accomplice smile, their eyes in a silent conversation of their own.

“Exhausting, I say” Doctor MacMillan rolled her eyes, exasperation without real bite in her demeanor. 

* * *

**5\. Tobias Butler**

Normally, when it came to exercising his stealth, Detective Inspector Jack Robinson relied on his most complicated cases. It was a key quality for a detective to be stealthy, to be able to flee a scene undetected or enter one without arising suspicion. And, normally, Jack Robinson was an example of stealth.

Nevertheless, exiting the home of one Honorable Phryne Fisher in the early morning always proved to be an impossible task for his abilities. Especially on days when he didn't have an early shift and he could indulge in a bit more sleep than usual, wrapped in Phryne's softness and warmth.

“Good morning, Inspector” the welcoming voice of Mr. Butler reached him as he was about to grab his coat, waiting for him in the hanger “Breakfast is ready, you arrived just in time”

“In…time?” his hand froze midair, feeling like his coat was miles away from him.

He should have known.

“Yes, the water for Miss Fisher’s tea is almost ready”

Jack felt obliged to desist on his escape plan and enter the kitchen, after that extremely kind offer. Nobody could say 'no' to Mr. Butler, after all.

“I have arranged the tray to fit both your breakfasts, Inspector” he took the kettle from the stove “I trust you’ll maneuver it easily enough”

Jack wasn’t sure what to respond, he just stared at the beautiful display on the tray, a kind of breakfast he didn’t tend to feast upon on a usual basis.

“Normally, it is Dot or myself who take Miss Fisher her breakfast” he explained, while pouring the water and letting the blend of tea work its magic “Since Dot doesn’t reside here anymore, after her and Mr. Collins moved together, I tend to take the tray myself, if she hasn’t arrived yet, but I assumed it would be better welcomed from you this morning, Inspector”

It had been a while since Jack’s visits to Phryne’s home had organically evolved from their mere nightcaps, and occasional dinner dates, to more lengthy encounters that lasted through the night. However, Jack tended to wake up early, slip by and go home to change before departing to the station.

He was aware that his morning escapes were not as unnoticed as he wanted them to be, judging by the greetings of either Mrs. Collins or Mr. Butler, or the less preferable occasions when Albert and Cecil were out by the front gate and wore knowing looks while seeing him exit the house. Still, Jack and Miss Fisher preferred to keep matters like that, for the time being.

There was a lot of figuring out to do, and Jack was, admittedly, a bit nervous about the part of Phryne Fisher waking up and having him still there, still in _her_ space.

This way, he thought, it was like every day was a start-over. This way, they could go on and continue in the same manner, avoiding exploring the more complicated sides of their relationship. This way, they could pretend nothing had changed. This way, he could avoid feeling like domesticity would make her feel trapped and chained to him, that it would turn her away. He was very scared that it would.

Now, having breakfast in bed, _that_ would surely change things. Majorly. He couldn’t think of anything more domestic than that.

“She didn’t ask me this specifically, Inspector” Mr. Butler interrupted Jack’s thoughts, while adding some napkins to the tray, in an impeccable manner “but I have noticed her demeanor in the mornings that you leave”

“Her demeanor?”

“I think she feels as confused as you” he turned to him then “but you know her, she is too proud to ask sometimes” he smiled “and I have the feeling that she would want you to stay, for once”

Mr. Butler handed him the tray and Jack felt as if he was entrusting him with a secret. An important, vulnerable secret that he had judged, after much consideration, that Jack was worthy of being trusted with. He took it with care and nodded in assent.

She was still sleeping when he entered her room with the tray, and a fond smile escaped his lips before he could even set it on the empty side of the bed.

“That smells delicious, Mr. Butler” she murmured, without opening her eyes.

“I’ll pass your congratulations to him later, then” he answered, the smile noticeable in his voice.

“Jack!” she opened her eyes at that, obviously surprised “I thought you’d be gone by now!”

“I hoped we could have breakfast together, if you don’t mind” he sat next to her on the bed and caressed her cheek, marveling at the ease with which she leaned on his touch.

Maybe they had been able to practice domesticity already, with every case they’d cracked together and every routine they had managed to perfect. Maybe things didn’t have to be that difficult.

“I’d love to” she responded, silencing his fears, at least for a while “but first, you should make it up to me”

At that, he stilled. Jack’s confused expression spoke for itself, because she just smirked and closed her eyes.

“You should have woken me up with a kiss” she explained, as if he was miles behind her train of thought and that amused her to no end “I’ll give you another chance”

Needless to say, he obliged.

* * *

**+1**

The gathering in the parlor was on full swing when Jack finally arrived at Wardlow. It was Phryne, though, not Mr. Butler, who let him in.

“Jack!”

He was learning to interpret the never-ending inflections with which she could pronounce his name. Some days it meant 'took you long enough', others it was with the purpose of pointing out 'I know you are teasing and I’d love you to continue'. There was always the sultry one, with a slightly elongated 'a', that was worth a million innuendos in one. There were also the ones he didn’t want to hear, a request to 'come back and talk to me', or the short way to condemn an inquiry to death when _she_ was the one who did not want to talk.

This one, though, was one of his favorites. It was the 'I was waiting for you and I’m delighted to see you' one. He had treasured it since he understood its meaning.

“Sorry I’m late” he put his coat and hat on the hanger as if he could get rid of his exhausting day just by doing so.

She noticed. Of course she noticed.

Her hands reached his and started caressing circles on his tired knuckles. An intimate routine they had started to develop, her way of letting him know he was home. That he had a home to come back to after a tiring day, not anymore just an empty house with empty memories of a life that was never enough for anyone in it. Even if he didn’t permanently reside with her, although he was in Wardlow increasingly more often as of late, it was the gestures that made him feel at home. It was her presence.

“You work too hard, Inspector” she smiled, her hands still caressing his “I’m going to start picking you up at the station and dragging you out of your desk myself”

“I’m sure you would actually do that” he got closer to her, like a magnet that was always pulling him in.

“Believe me, you do not want to find out” she teased, impossibly close now, her lips just a whisper away.

The sound of throats being cleared awkwardly pulled them away from their reverie.

Oh, yes, there was a gathering. Somehow, he had forgotten.

“Good evening, Inspector” it was Albert, with a knowing smirk, the first one to speak.

“Nice to see you’re getting cozy already” Cecil continued, because it always was like that with those two, as if their provocations and teasing were group rehearsed and coordinated.

Maybe they were.

“Good evening” he said, taking his hands away from Phryne’s grip.

Her deadly glare to her guests was enough of an indicator of the extent she would have liked to remain uninterrupted.

“You _could_ mind your own business, you know” she declared, to everyone in general, as she entered the parlor and took a glass offered by Mr. Butler.

“It’s not like you’re particularly subtle, though, my dear” Doctor MacMillan chimed in, already at ease on the chaise.

“I don’t know what you mean, we’re perfectly discreet” she retorted.

The thundering laughter that emerged from the guests, their _so called_ friends, was enough to wake up the entire street. Jack almost dropped the glass he was being offered at their sudden reaction.

He was about to feel particularly mortified when he saw Phryne’s face. It was the rarest sight to see Miss Phryne Fisher looking as if she had missed something important. After witnessing that, he couldn’t feel anything but grateful for the opportunity.

“I don’t know what you’re all laughing at” she argued, offended, more like a petulant child than an angry force of nature.

She seemed especially betrayed by Jane being unable to stop laughing. Even if it was, after all, at his expense, Jack couldn’t help but smiling too.

“Phryne, you’ve both been painfully obvious since even before you were…whatever it is you’re doing these days” Doctor MacMillan took some time to regain her composure.

“It’s not like things changed as much anyway, Miss” Mrs. Collins offered “It’s like it’s always been, almost”

“With all due respect,” Collins himself was blushing “you’ve never been particularly subtle, so it’s not really a big difference”

A flustered Phryne Fisher, that was a sight to behold. He couldn’t help but laugh alongside the rest, even when she looked at him with a dramatic expression of betrayal. He wondered why, though, it would make her feel embarrassed in any way, she had always been a flirt and never hid the fact. There was a side of him that worried thinking it might be his fault, that being seen with _him_ made her uncomfortable. But then she smiled at him, honest and open, and that gave him a reason to calm his worries, for a while.

\- -

It wasn’t until much later that he had a chance to ask. When all guests had gone home or retired to sleep, when they were both alone in the parlor, laying by the window, her body draped across his, his hand caressing her hair.

“Were you really surprised that people realized that we are…” he was hesitant with his words, so much so that he didn’t know how to finish his question.

“A little, maybe” she confessed “I was more surprised that they would talk about it openly, I guess, because we rarely do ourselves”

It was true, they didn’t. They weren’t, under any means, unaware of what they were doing. They had danced back and forth on a thin line for a long time, throughout their partnership, and were well aware that any movement forward would be a point of no return.

He had taken a chance on the airfield by kissing her. She had taken a chance by asking him to follow her. They had met halfway on her way back. They let things evolve on their own, without overthinking.

Jack had been once in a relationship by the book, following every rule and every convention. It hadn’t been enough for either and had ended in gradual disinterest, like a flame slowly diminishing until not even ashes were left, and he knew that the worst thing wasn’t a broken heart but the void left behind by feelings no longer there, vanishing as if they had never existed in the first place.

Phryne had been once in a relationship led by passion, where she had let someone else take all power over her. It had almost destroyed her, made her feel vulnerable and breakable, almost beyond repair. She understood that her agency was not something to be given away.

He had subsequently hid on work, propriety and duty. She had felt safe in freedom, rule-defying and ephemeral passions. Somehow, somewhere in between, they had met. And there was no turning back from there.

“I’m worried, sometimes” she broke the silence, her voice barely a whisper in his ear “that you avoid talking about it because you’re scared of me running away if we did” her hand caressed his chest and stopped over his heart.

“Before coming back, _I_ was scared” she admitted, not looking at him “I was scared that everyone would have moved on without me, because that is what happens. I am the force of nature that passes through people’s lives, who changes things, who makes a mess, sometimes for the worse and sometimes for the better. I am the amazing memory in men’s heads, the friend in times of need of the girls I’ve known, the ephemeral adventure in Madagascar and the guardian angel, helping lovers to marry their promised wives. I leave and the world goes on without me”

She wanted to continue but seemed to need time. Jack caressed her back comfortingly, pulling her close, until she was ready.

“This time it was different” her voice was steadier then, more certain “This time I had made a home here, with Dot, with Jane, with Mac, with Bert and Cec and Mr. Butler and Hugh. With _you_. So I took the opportunity to leave, not only because I had to, but because I panicked a bit, at the sight of so much… _permanence_ ”

She took his hand firmly, like a life-line.

“And, as I was leaving, with Dot married and Jane in school and…I was terrified at the possibility of coming back to see you had all moved on without me…as it always happens” she looked at him then, openly “That’s why I asked you to follow me, knowing nothing of how we’d manage or how we’d make this work, I just wanted you, of all people, to stay still, to be the same when I saw you again” she caressed his jawline, his neck, his chest “But I don’t want you to walk on eggshells for me, waiting permanently for my instructions, I don’t want you to silence yourself for me, Jack, as much as I won’t do for you…we’re partners in this too, equals…we’re a team”

Her eyes were gleaming in the moonlight that filtered through the window. Her make-up had been removed some time earlier, her hair was tangled, her body draped with one of her dark silk robes. He knew then, beyond any doubt, that she was his home.

When they kissed, they also met halfway. As their lips sealed the space between them, his answer to her request was written in the way his body entangled with hers. They would figure it out, together, as a team. And, if the world noticed, then so be it.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first time I write something for this specific fandom, I really _really_ hope I didn’t ruin everything. It was also my first try of the 5+1 fic trope, and I got a bit too carried away in the last part, I understand maybe I went a bit beyond the original intention to keep it lighthearted, but I couldn’t help myself with these two vintage dorks. 
> 
> I love this show so much, I’ve pledged my bit to make the movie happen and, in the meantime, here we are. Hopefully, if this wasn’t entirely terrible, I’ll write more stuff for this fandom, because there’s so much I’d like to try, this was my silly little way of trying my hand with these characters and make a fluffy little thing to lift up my mood. There’s a visual complement to this fic in this gifset I made [here](http://starberry-cupcake.tumblr.com/post/166489813990/in-the-land-of-lethe-ao3-phryne-fisherjack). 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!


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